Taylor Morrison aims to raise $524 million

Taylor Morrison Home Corp. -- the Arizona-based homebuilder proposing Southwest Florida's first golf course in five years -- has filed to raise as much as $523.8 million in an initial public offering.

About 23.8 million shares are being offered at $20 to $22 each, according to a regulatory filing Monday by the Scottsdale, Ariz.-based company.

Taylor Morrison plans to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "TMHC."

The builder's Esplanade at Lakewood Ranch will have the region's first private links to be built since 2008. In addition to the 400-acre golf course, the community will contain 1,250 homesites on 600 acres.

With its IPO, Taylor Morrison is seeking to benefit from a recovery in home sales and prices, which have climbed following the worst housing crash since the Great Depression.

Taylor Morrison's owners, which include TPG Capital and Oaktree Capital Management LP, are taking advantage of rising demand for new equities as record-high U.S. stocks help fuel a pickup in the IPO market.

"We believe that a U.S. housing recovery is under way on a national basis, driven by consumers who are increasingly optimistic about their economic prospects," the company said in the prospectus filed Monday.

Besides Florida, Taylor Morrison builds homes in Arizona, California, Colorado, Texas and Ontario, Canada. It was sold in 2011 by its British parent, Taylor Wimpey PLC, to a group of investors backed by David Bonderman's TPG, Los Angeles-based Oaktree and JH Investments Inc.

Following the IPO, TPG and Oaktree will each hold 39.5 percent of the shares, while investors in the offering will hold 19.5 percent, according to the prospectus. The $21 midpoint values Taylor Morrison's outstanding common stock at $2.57 billion, the regulatory filing shows.

Taylor Morrison is selling all of the stock in the offering and will use proceeds to repay borrowings and purchase shares from TPG and Oaktree, the filing shows.

Taylor Morrison had profits of $430.8 million on revenue of $1.4 billion in 2012, ranking among the 10 largest publicly traded U.S. homebuilders, according to the prospectus. It sold 4,014 homes with an average price of $364,000.

Following the IPO, Taylor Morrison intends to sell $500 million of debt, subject to market conditions, for working capital and general purposes.

Credit Suisse Group AG and Citigroup Inc. are leading the stock sale.

Besides its Esplanade development, Taylor Morrison has been buying property around the region.

Last month, it bought 213 acres in the Palmer Ranch development for a new community. The company will be the developer and builder of Arbor Lakes on Palmer Ranch, with plans to construct about 267 single-family homes. Taylor Morrison said it plans to break ground this spring.

The homebuilder recently began selling at its 77-acre Esplanade by Siesta Key off Clark Road, a gated subdivision that will contain 247 single-family home sites.